This article elaborates upon the notion of media enjoyment in the context of film viewing by proposing a complementary type of gratification that we conceptualize as appreciation. Three studies were conducted to tap into the multidimensionality of viewers' entertainment gratifications with a special focus on the domain of more serious, poignant,…

Research has examined the ability of entertainment-education (E-E) programs to influence behavior across a variety of health and social issues. However, less is known about the underlying mechanisms that account for these effects. In keeping with the extended elaboration likelihood model (E-ELM) and the entertainment overcoming resistance model…

News reports of scientific research are rarely hedged; in other words, the reports do not contain caveats, limitations, or other indicators of scientific uncertainty. Some have suggested that hedging may influence news consumers' perceptions of scientists' and journalists' credibility (perceptions that may be related to support for scientific…

Examines adolescents' television viewing motives, activities, and satisfaction, in an attempt to integrate the audience activity construct into the uses and gratifications model. Suggests that more strongly motivated viewers engage more actively in various audience activities throughout the viewing process and receive greater viewing satisfaction…

Examines how viewers or readers process and remember media narratives such as entertainment, news, and information. Considers how this is critical to the understanding of the mental processing of television and other media. Finds that undergraduate students who participated in two experiments remembered atypical story items much better even a week…

Develops and tests hypotheses concerning the relationship of specific advertising strategies to affective and analytic cognitive responses of the audience. Analyses undergraduate students' responses to 240 advertisements. Demonstrates that advertising strategy variables accounted substantially for the variance in affective and analytic cognition.…

Examines the role of motives, attitudes, and audience activity in explaining affective, cognitive, and behavioral involvement of daytime soap opera viewers. Finds that viewing attention and perceived realism of soap opera content correlated with parasocial interaction, suggesting that parasocial interaction may be a functional alternative to…

Examines the influence of prior information on children's emotional responses to a frightening program. Finds that forewarning of the threat increased anticipatory fear but did not affect emotional responses, and that prior knowledge of the happy outcome reduced anticipatory fear but had an inconsistent effect on fear during the threatening scene.…

Examines the validity of audience involvement in the context of local television news by testing the relationships among (1) strength of news viewing motivation and involvement intensity; (2) type of news viewing motivation and involvement orientation; and (3) cognitive and emotional involvement. Finds that audience involvement during message…

Examines the influence of happy outcome information and coping style on fourth and fifth graders' emotional responses to a frightening film sequence. Finds that prior knowledge of the happy outcome reduced self-reported fear and worry for "blunters" but not for "monitors." Discusses interpretations of findings and implications for understanding…

Examines how college students' marital schemata influences their evaluations of television couples' marital satisfaction. Finds that greater similarity between marital schemata and ratings of television couples' marriage type was associated with higher ratings of perceived television marital satisfaction. Notes that this effect held only for the…

Argues that television, when used as a secondary activity, interferes with performance on otherwise intellectually demanding tasks. Examines performance on seven different cognitive processing tests for respondents in four television-viewing conditions and a no-TV control group. Finds significant performance decrements for measures of reading…